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Mad Dog Goes Underground
Thanks to John Mark Walker for sending over a great spoof video performed by Jon "mad dog" Hall -and given the recent "myth debunking by Microsoft, the linux4u project seems timely. The project is intended to educate the corporate setting about the benefits of Linux. Grab the Mad Dog videos (high bandwidth) here and (low bandwith) here and see what I mean about mad dog going underground. RealPlayer is required.
Thank you for that link :o) The video is just awesome.... and what that guy's saying is, well, true hehe Anyone have links to more such like stuff? *g*
Glad I caught it now... ;-)
How long will it be before a site with a 300kb video stream is slashdotted? Not long I bet
Is really amusing though.. Wish I could figgure out how to save it with the free realplayer alpha...
Blessed are the pessimists, for they have made backups.
That is the most lame article I have read on /.
/. is becoming so big that they are not able to control the quality of articles posted anymore.
Its amazing how
There have been so many articles that have been posted on some topic which was discussed just the day before.
CmdrTaco, are you listening ? And most importantly are you doing something about it !
From the timeline of e-seminars...
Oct. 27th
Linux in Mission Critical Applications - Brookhaven National Labs
It's nice to know they aren't using NT...
WTF type of file is that? Does anyone have a player for it? I'm on a Sparc 2 running Linux, so I'd (obviously) prefer source.
Wow - this has to be the least insightful piece I've ever seen on posted on /. It's nothing that hasn't been said 10,000,000 times here before. It's just wrapped up in an unfunny, high-bandwidth package. I love Linux, but this is just silly...
But the server is already starting to get slashdotted.
Check out the fragments of code flying around in the background. Kernel source? Crypto code?
Now, if only Hemos would fix the post to read correctly. The video is of Jon 'Maddog' Hall, for those who haven't seen him speak (bouncing and handwaving included)
the AC
Hemos is like...sci-fi fans;he thinks technology is cool, but he hasn't bothered to understand the science it's based on
Was this video supposed to be funny? It was just some old guy with a beard telling us how Linux is stable and easy to administer. Duh. This is non-news.
/. input to re-write their article. And he says that that was a BAD idea. There's something to talk about.
On the other hand, check out the latest Cringley column which talks about the bogus Israeli claim of the 12 ms 512 bit RSA crack. Also talks about how Jane's used
JB
Why is that? They don't seem to be asking for money - just names and email addresses. If I register, will I get spammed? Will I get billed later?
Banner ads are bad enough - more spam is a nightmare.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Also, is there something wrong with broadcast.com? When I request the file to save it, I get the below:
% telnet webevents.broadcast.com 80 Trying 206.190.46.117... Connected to webevents.broadcast.com. Escape character is '^]'. GET /valinux/maddog_spoof_300.ram pnm://rvarc001.broadcast.com/events/valinux/maddog _spoof_300.rmConnection closed by foreign host.
What is that? It's not a redirect or the video. I don't have an entry for "pnm" in my /etc/services file. Because I couldn't d/l it, I couldn't run file on it to try and determine its type. Is their server broken?
I was hoping this topic might come up on slashdot. I am subscribed to receive notice of the Linux4u seminars. I've watched them and can honestly say they are a waste of time. Most slashdotters will learn nothing new. I wouldn't even recommend to uninformed management. But watch them yourself and I think you'll agree with me.
It's the streaming protocol for RealPlayer stuff. I'm pretty sure that there's nothing that even pretends to be a RealPlayer for ANY form of *NIX.
And no plans for one, either.
Brazil has decided you're cute.
Personally, I think is a good idea - getting videos out that corporate people understand. It's a good answer to the marketing that Microsoft do, and its similar to some of thier presentations.
The people that are being used are respected people in the industry and if yiu are looking for a way to convince your corporate ladder this sort of thing is a good way to go.
The advancement of Linux, especially in critical areas is something thats more needed. People have to be willing to get it publicised too. Without good publicity and good presentations its always going to be seen in the light of the Microsoft FUD.
Once Linux gets more publicity in areas that are critical it will start getting a wider industry approval, and especially if presentations and seminars like this are done more.
When I got Linux into my workplace, I won it on the cost argument, but thats not always going to work. Being able to reference seminars like this is always a good thing.
Unfortunately, the whole point of real player is to *prevent* you from saving it. I wish there was a MPEG or such avalible.
This is easy enough to get around. Streaming Realplayer files come in two pieces; the audio/video clip itself (.ra for pure audio, .rm for movies), and a stub file, which has a .ram extension. The .ram file is just a 1-line text file which points to the URL of the actual content. This is so the browser knows to start the streaming media player plugin, rather than having the download the whole X megabytes of content first.
In most cases, you can just download the .ram file to find out the URL of the actual content, and then get your browser (or better yet, something like wget) to pull down the .ra or .rm file for your archives. Of course, this doesn't work with "live" streaming content (like a concert simulcast) but for any pre-recorded clip it should work just fine.
http://users2.50megs.com/mattwmiller/WinTux.html
*feeding the troll*
What causes this delusional attitude that someone who's referring to himself as 'Mad Dog' would be qualified to educate the corporate world about the benefits(?) of Linux and actually be taken seriously?
For those newbies who don't know who John "Maddog" Hall is....
He's the Executive Director of Linux International, and a well known Linux advocate and developer. (to give you an idea how well known, a Google search for "John Maddog Hall" turned up 1030 entries. Not many of us can claim to be that well known). According to the www.opensource.org website, he is also one of the creaters of the phrase "opensource".
Here's his bio from the Linux International web site...
Jon "maddog" Hall
Address: 80 Amherst St., Amherst N.H. 03031-3032, U.S.A.
E-Mail: maddog@valinux.com
Employer: VA Linux Systems
Description: Jon has been in the computer industry for over a quarter century, 17 years of that with UNIX. He has been a software engineer, systems administrator, product manager, marketing manager and professional educator. Before accepting a job at VA Linux Systems working full time for Linux International, Jon was employed by Compaq Computer Corporation in the Digital UNIX Marketing group and Bell Laboratories. Before that he was Department Head of Computer Science at Hartford State Technical College, where his students lovingly (he hopes) gave him the nickname maddog. Maddog as he perfers to be called, has an MS in Computer Science from RPI (1977) and a BS in Commerce and Engineering from Drexel University (1973).
he was the guy who arranged for Digital to ship one of their hot new Alpha systems to Linus. And this was when Alpha was still really new (eg 93 or something). Linus did the basic port to it in something like 2 weeks. The first ever port of linux.
He's been pushing linux inside DEC/Compaq ever since. Mad Dog had the kind of standing to push linux at the boardroom level. So Compaq's pro-linux attitude is due to him in no small way.
He also been a great Ambassador for linux, and has been an active member of Linux International for a very long time.
One of linux's more low-profile, but most influential proponents.
I use Friend/Foe + mod-point modifiers as a karma/reputation system.
If you don't get it, you haven't been there, done that. To know mad dog is to love mad dog. And you're right. It is silly. So is Linux in it's own ways.
seems like linux4u definately has a good intention. it also has well-known figures in opensource community and IT world.
/dev/urandom .signature
but is it really wise to put it on the net as video?
there's quite a bit of material on this subject, readily available for viewing on the net.
i personally think a good collection of several such resources would have a similar effect,
instead of wasting lots of bandwidth (money?) on videos.
it's also interesting to note that several of those giving speeches in the subject have written these documents.
have a look at these few urls, which probably encapsulate what the videos do, at a fragment of the data
www.linux.com
www.opensource.org - tech cases, explanation of opensource and businessperson/customer cases
www.samba.org
www.redhat.com
and so on... this is the internet! the data is out there! why send it out on bandwidth-consuming video?
sidenote: bandwidth is a very precious resource where i live (outside the states), so that's a touchy subject...
ln -s
hmmm, funny or flamebait...you decide.
+&x
What I hate about this stuff is that there is no option to just freaking download the damn video!
.RA file, so that we can just download it.
Look, I live in the country. I have about as much chance of getting broadband access this millenium (i.e. before 2001 because that is the millenium dammit) as Bill Gates using Linux for his house. (less, actually). All I want to do is start a download at the paultry 28.8 kbps I get, and walk away. I'll watch the video when it is finished, whenever that is.
Some things they stream to keep you from saving a copy, but something by maddog? Where's the "open source" in that? There ought to be an FTP site with the actual
This is one of the many areas that Geeks In Space gets right: I can just download the file, and listen when I get it!
www.eFax.com are spammers
How many other names have you been here done that with that you can put a face to? Or hear 'em talk and move and advocate? I've got high bandwidth. Include movies with EVERY story. Let's make /. even more freakin' amazing. Get yourself a G4, digival video camera, and start making content. Signal not noise. Maybe in a year or two you can be a milly-on-air like our Taco friend, whatever, just quit bitching.
+&x
Well let's see. Did they use emacs to composite the text? Did Apache capture the video? Did they scale down, sharpen, and white balance the images using The Gimp? One frame at a time or did they edit 130 layers one layer at a time? The only problem is that unless they were visited by an alien race, they had to use NT to produce the very footage which criticizes it.
Correct me if I wrong, but Linux doesn't have video editing software, does it?
This is a very true point, though they could have used an SGI or Mac to do the job. Still, Linux doesn't have this kind of software yet.
This amuses me greatly, that such a 'big man' of the Linux community would go and make a video that I can't even find a player for on Linux.
ROFL.
roflol
RealNetworks sells a copy of their RealProducer for linux. This allows you to create audio/video
/ index.html
content in the RealMedia format on linux.
http://www.real.com/products/tools/producerplus
There are free and pay versions available with different levels of functionality. Both support live capture and broadcast to server modes.
I'm amazed at how people throw this rhetoric around about Linux being more stable than NT. Yet, no one can define stable, and no one has done any serious metrics of this claim. It is simply unfounded fluff to make Linux geeks feel good. I personally run both a Linux box and an NT box. Both run as web servers, and the NT box is also a file server, print server, and database server. Yet, I'm constantly having to reboot my Linux box because apache keeps crashing under the load that the crappy Linux ethernet code can't handle. I'm just going to switch to FreeBSD and give up on Linux. Later geeks.
well ive seen a lot of people flaming this post but i think it is great.
youve got to remember that most execs dont know ISA from PCI. so a simple yet informative method to get them to realize the value of linux and open source is great. sure no one that has been using linux for a few months is going to learn anything new. but i bet some admins who have used NT all their carreer and want a change are finding it very useful
the linux4u project is a good idea and probably a little bit of what linux needs to get execs to understand the value.
although thats just my two cents
tyler
It was a marketing vehicle targeted at execs and senior managers. The VA/Red Hat/Linuxcare folks apparently felt it was worth funding. They'll be able to tell by looking at the registration info they collect, I suppose. It was a pretty low-key effort, AFAICT.